Lena Waithe

Vanity Fair’s new editor-in-chief Radhika Jones has picked for her first cover The Chi and Master of None breakout star, a choice that some see as a change of direction for the magazine known for its focus on the Hollywood elite.

Following her breakout Emmy-winning success on Master of None and Showtime's The Chi, Waithe will next try to bring to the small screen a semi-autobiographical comedy about a "queer black girl" named Hattie and her two straight girlfriends, who “spend most of their days talking sh*t and chasing their dreams." Long in gestation, Waithe first posted to YouTube a multi-part pilot presentation for the series back in 2013. “I always wanted to tell a story where a queer black woman was the protagonist and I’m so grateful to TBS for giving me a platform to tell this story," says Waithe, who will also write the single-camera comedy. Queer black characters have been the sidekick for long enough, it’s time for us to finally take the lead.”

Waithe says of her Master of None collaborator: “Here's the truth — in every situation, it's not always black and white,” she says. “And I know that's simple for people, and it's easy for people to (ask), 'Whose side are you on?' There are no sides, really, in some of these scenarios."

The Showtime series also has a lot in common with The Wire creator David Simon's acclaimed HBO series Treme, says Matt Zoller Seitz. “Like Shameless and Treme, The Chi is “mainly concerned with the lives of working class and poor people struggling to survive day-to-day, rather than the system they’re struggling within,” says Seitz. “It’s a rare drama that bothers to remind us that even when somebody in your family dies unexpectedly, you still have to work, pay rent, and drive mom around. Yet somehow, for all the occasional horror and persistent indignity, life goes on here, every day, every minute, and The Chi appreciates that as well, often pausing to take in the beauty of an intricately painted mural on the wall of a bodega, or the way the orange sunset light glints off the side of an elevated train rounding a curve.”

The Lena Waithe-created Showtime series built a fake corner store in a Chicago neighborhood located in a “food desert” where grocery stores are badly needed. When filming recently finished, the show reportedly left behind a mess of paint chips on the sidewalk and a dumpster full of food that neighborhood residents quickly dived into. Representatives of The Chi have yet to respond to the accusations.

“So many other people could have won, but I think that, for whatever reason, there’s a person that is the vessel,” says Waithe, the first black female winner of the Emmy for best comedy writing, echoing Berry’s Oscar speech. “I hope to leave a path for others to follow, and to break down doors for others to walk through.”

Waithe, the first black woman to be nominated for an Emmy for comedy writing, says: “I’ll be honest, writing that episode was the most freeing experience I’ve ever had. It’s the difference in going from being a slave to being free. They didn’t bring in somebody to rewrite me or put it through a filter of somebody that doesn’t look like me to make it more palatable for a broader audience. Our writers’ draft versus the real one is like 98 percent the same. That never happens, but what that says to me is, when it does happen that’s when success comes.”